Sorcery & Cecelia: Or the Enchanted Chocolate Pot (7 page)

“It is quite true,” I told him.

He gave a bark of laughter that was not at all pleasant. “Too late, Miss Rushton. I’m not so gullible that I can be caught twice with a smoothly told tale. I might have believed you once, but not after I saw your reaction to the news that Miranda Griscomb is coming to Tarleton Hall, and not now that I find you poking through Sir Hilary’s magic books. I’m afraid you’re out of luck there; he keeps the really important ones in his laboratory, like most good wizards.”

“I was simply admiring Sir Hilary’s collection,” I said, retreating around the end of a low couch. I felt better with something between me and that angry expression.

Mr. Tarleton snorted. “It won’t wash, my girl. Miranda and Hilary have had a falling-out, I suppose, and she’s taking advantage of all this to have you snoop through his things.”

By this time I was quite outraged. “I was
not
snooping,” I said. “How dare you accuse me of any such thing? If anyone is snooping, it is you, and I very much wish Squire Bryant had
another
goat, for I think you deserve it!”

Mr. Tarleton ignored this completely. “What is Miranda up to?” he demanded.

He was starting toward me, and in quite a menacing manner, when a knock at the library door announced the housekeeper, at long last bringing my lemonade. I took it gratefully and downed it with far more speed than was strictly ladylike (to keep her in the room; I did
not
want to be alone with James Tarleton again!). Mr. Tarleton took snuff while I drank; it is a habit he seems to resort to when under stress. (And I must say that I am still amazed that someone as well turned out in other ways as Mr. Tarleton would use such a vulgarly ostentatious snuffbox as that green-and-blue enameled one he carries. I suppose he must be sentimentally attached to it for some reason.)

When Mr. Tarleton and I were quite finished snubbing each other with magnificent unconcern, Mrs. Porter escorted us to the side door. This let out onto the veranda where Aunt Elizabeth and Lady Tarleton were sitting. Aunt Elizabeth was quite surprised to see us together, and coming from the house instead of the maze, but Mr. Tarleton passed it off with a remark about my having been overcome with the heat. Aunt Elizabeth looked at me suspiciously, for she knows I never swoon and am quite fond of warm weather, but she did not say anything, and the rest of the day passed off without further incident.

I was relieved to reach home with my pilfered book safe (do not scold, Kate; I shall return it to Sir Hilary anonymously, by post, as soon as I am finished with it, and how else was I to find out anything about charm-bags?). I spent the evening reading it, and was quite impressed with how complex a charm-bag really is. Unfortunately, it is very hard to identify the type of charm unless one knows what herbs were used. I shall spend part of tomorrow trying to sort out the herbs in the bag Mary found in Oliver’s room, but one dried bit of leaf looks very much like another, so I have little hope of success. The whole matter makes me dreadfully uneasy; I have taken to cleaning out my hairbrush every morning and burning the residue. I hope to finish Sir Hilary’s book tomorrow evening; in the afternoon, I intend to pay a call on Dorothea and see whether I can get a peek at her Mama.

Yours ever,

Cecy

10 May 1817

11 Berkeley Square, London

My dearest Cecy,

I’m afraid I’ve made a dreadful mull of it this time. I’ve told Aunt Charlotte that Oliver’s gone back to Rushton for a few days, just on business for Uncle. And, of course, he may have, and oh,
dear
, how I wish he might have, but really it is just another bouncer of mine. But I had to think of something, because he’s gone missing.

I do hope you can read my handwriting. I skinned my palm and even though it is much better this morning it makes it hard to hold the pen quite steady.

It was in Vauxhall Gardens I last saw him, and that was my dear sister’s fault entirely. We had gone to dinner at the Grenvilles’ and were meant to go from there to the opera with Alice Grenville and her twin brothers. But no sooner was the meal over than Alice Grenville and Georgina swept me upstairs, where they had dominoes for the three of us—and George and Andrew escorted us not to the opera but to Vauxhall, without paying the slightest attention to a word I said. (I wanted to see that opera particularly. It was the last performance of
I Dilletanti.)

Because I knew perfectly well that I would get the blame for the entire expedition, I was in no mood to be pleased, but I admit Vauxhall is pretty enough. I doubt you’ll have the chance to see it for yourself next Season, since it is
nearly
as vulgar as Aunt Charlotte said, so I’ll just describe the place as best I can.

Vauxhall is a large garden with carefully arranged thickets and sandy paths. In the heart of the garden are boxes with flimsy chairs where one may sit to watch other people promenade about by the light of paper lanterns, or dance to a little orchestra playing popular airs (ever so slightly flat). As we entered the lantern-lit clearing, Alice Grenville declared there were nightingales in the thickets. So no sooner were we in the box George and Andrew procured for us than Georgina went off with Andrew to search for one, leaving me with Alice and George. George insisted on ordering rack punch and slivered ham, despite the perfectly enormous meal we had just consumed at Grenville House.

Well, of course, after a quarter of an hour, I expected to catch a glimpse of Georgina among the crowd walking past. I was a bit concerned for her, alone with her twin. By the greatest misfortune, Oliver chose that moment to arrive in pursuit of Georgy. He pounced on me and demanded to know what I was thinking of to let life in the Ton go so dreadfully to Georgina’s head. I was taken aback for a moment but replied at once in a calm voice that I’ve almost grown to hate (for I seldom know what I’m going to say in it, and sometimes it comes out with the most dreadful lies, always in the same plausible tone) that Georgy and I had made a wager that she masked could dance with more men than I unmasked. My voice went on quite pleasantly to say that if he couldn’t keep from interfering in a simple sportin’ wager, he should go home and get Aunt Charlotte to make him a posset. Otherwise, he’d best sit down and join us.

“A simple sportin’ wager,” he huffed at me. “I should think you would know better than to jest about such things with a member of the family. And if you’re not jesting, you must be mad.”

“I suppose I must be,” I agreed, “but at least I am not bacon-brained enough to preach a sermon in Vauxhall Gardens.”

You may imagine Oliver’s response. It was a masterpiece of priggish indignation that, reduced to its bare essentials, amounted to an accusation that we were having fun without him. When he was quite finished, he called me a rag-mannered chit and marched off to find Georgina, which, I own, I was hoping he would do for quite some time.

I apologized to Alice and George and went back to craning my neck to look for Georgy.

An hour went by, Cecy, and a worse hour I have yet to pass, in London or out of it. I saw Oliver in the distance twice, but there wasn’t a sign of Georgy. As you may imagine, I grew worried and then more worried, until finally Alice and the twin agreed to stroll with me in the direction of the illuminations. After all, Alice told me bracingly, it was possible Oliver simply didn’t recognize Georgy in her domino.

We walked down a winding path and reached a little Greek temple lit with paper lanterns. It seemed a good idea to separate and search the shrubbery round about. I took a wrong step somehow, and found myself in a thicket with no temple in sight and no reply to my call. After a moment of uneasiness, it struck me what seemed wrong. The shadowy coppice was altogether silent. No nightingale sang, nor could I hear any faint strain of the orchestra.

Puzzled and a little alarmed, I stood in the dark, the flat of my hand resting on the trunk of the tree before me. I was struck with a sudden sense of unreasonable apprehension (in addition to my perfectly reasonable apprehension, common to any girl foolish enough to lose herself at night in the woods of Vauxhall). You may therefore imagine my reaction when a hand covered mine and held me there, palm against the smooth bark.

“I thought I told you to stay in well-lit ballrooms,” said Thomas Schofield in my ear.

I managed to stop my scream before it got to my lips. After a moment I said quite evenly, “Ill met by moonlight, my dear Marquis.” I admit this was not exactly brilliant, but I think that under the circumstances I did fairly well.

“On the contrary, my dear half-wit,” he replied, “for your sake, we are very well met. But a very little longer and you’d not have left this wood for quite some time.” Right hand over my right hand, he moved to stand behind me. “Hold out your left hand,” he said.

“Stop that,” I said. “What on earth are you doing?”

“Rescuing you, silly,” he said. “Hold out your left hand.” Cautiously, I did so. He took it in his and stood so close behind me that I have no doubt that but for the hood of the silken domino I wore, I could have felt his breath stir my hair. The fingers of his left hand laced with mine and he drew our clasped hands forward until our fingertips rested very lightly against my forehead, as though to shield my eyes.

I stood straight and still, trying to ignore his proximity, as he held me circled in his arms. For the Marquis’s part, he seemed to ignore me in return. In addition to the oddity of our stance, he began to mutter. His voice was a very soft steady repetition of words I could not catch, a droning chant that almost had a tune. After about four bars of this, I realized I could hear the orchestra again, a faint distant music through the trees.

“There,” said the Marquis. “Nothing elegant, but it ought to do the trick.” His right hand still on mine, he clasped hard and pried it off the bark of the tree. And indeed, when it did come free, it felt to me as though I left every bit of skin on my palm stuck to the bark. It hurt like blazes and I would have liked very much to exclaim aloud, but I did not wish to do so before the odious Marquis. He kept my hand clasped firmly in his right while he fumbled in his pocket with his left. After a moment he produced a silk handkerchief and did a fairly clumsy job of bandaging my hand with it, muttering under his breath the while.

Perhaps it was the muttering or perhaps the silk handkerchief, but in a few minutes the pain eased and I was able to say, “I can’t think how you knew I was here.”

“Luckily for you,” he said, “you shed hairpins the way Hansel and Gretel shed crumbs. I followed your trail.” He pressed a half dozen hairpins into the palm of my left hand. “Now let us return to light, safety, and society.”

He led me out of the thicket back to the little temple, and we found ourselves in the ring of lamplight. In the center of the ring were both Grenville twins, Alice Grenville, Frederick Hollydean, and Georgina, who had her head on Alice’s shoulder, sobbing lustily.

I glanced back at Thomas Schofield to find him gazing down his nose at me in a most annoying way. “What’s happened?” I demanded. “Is she hurt?”

“I suggest you ask her,” he replied. “I do so hate to intrude in a family squabble.”

“Truly,” Georgina was saying, between sniffs and sobs that made the Grenville twins look thunderously upon Frederick Hollydean, “I never meant to flirt with all of you. I never meant to flirt with
any
of you. I only meant to make Oliver angry. And now it’s all gone wrong, for I sent him a note telling him I would be here and he didn’t even bother to come rescue me from the consequences of my folly.”

“But Oliver is here,” I said briskly. “I sent him after you. I can’t imagine what’s keeping him. He was quite angry enough to suit even you, Georgina.”

Georgy lifted her head and regarded me with reproach. “Kate, where have you
been
?”

I looked back at Thomas but the wretch was gone, melted back into the shrubbery. If he guessed what the rest of that particular squabble would be like, I can’t blame him. If I’d known, I’d have gone slinking off myself. At the end of Georgina’s tirade I was finally able to distract her (for she seemed strangely eager to forget her behavior by complaining of mine) by asking, “Yes, but where’s Oliver?”

And no one knew. We searched the gardens until the lamplighters came to put out the lanterns, without success. The Grenvilles brought us home so late Aunt Charlotte had dozed off in her chair beside the door, so we were able to avoid her first wrath. But now we are no better off, for I am confined to my room and we cannot send anyone to search for Oliver without giving the entire business away.

It’s all the most dreadful muddle, and I’m sure I have quite a thousand other things to tell you but I can’t think of a thing but poor Oliver. I’m so worried I could scream, and I can’t betray more than faint concern lest I set Georgina off into tears again.

I can’t help but wonder if Aunt Charlotte allowed me to have a bedroom all to myself expressly so she could lock me up when I was disobedient. Only think how difficult it would be for her to confine me to my room if I still shared with Georgy.

Believe me, I shall write the instant I have any news. Meanwhile, do try not to go mad with concern. It would be quite foolish for all three of us to fuss ourselves into fits when none of us can do anything.

Love,

Kate

13 May 1817

Rushton Manor, Essex

Dearest Kate,

Miranda Griscomb is
just
as dreadful as Dorothea says she is, and though I am not
perfectly
certain she is your Miranda, I do not have the least difficulty in believing that she would try to poison people with chocolate.

She arrived yesterday while I was taking tea with Dorothea and Lady Tarleton. They were awaiting her arrival, of course; in fact, she was two days later than her letter had led them to expect. When we heard the carriage drive up, Dorothea turned quite white. A few minutes later, the footman threw open the sitting room door and announced Mrs. Griscomb.

She
swept
into the room, Kate, looking for all the world as if she were returning to her own house after a morning’s shopping instead of arriving at Tarleton Hall after goodness knows how long in a traveling coach. I do not know how she achieved such an effect, for she is quite short and, considering matters dispassionately, not at all imposing. When she is present, however, it is not possible to consider matters dispassionately. I believe it is because she has what Aunt Elizabeth refers to as a
forceful
personality. It does not hurt in the least that she is so prodigious elegant that she makes even Lady Tarleton seem a dowd. I cannot picture her with her hair powdered, but her eyes certainly fit your description—hard and cold and very dark.